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Week 2.1 Introduction To Psychology 1 Script

1) The document provides an introduction to the field of psychology, covering its definition, history, and early schools of thought. 2) Psychology is defined as the scientific study of human behavior and mental processes. Its roots can be traced back thousands of years to ancient beliefs, but it emerged as a formal science in the late 19th century with Wilhelm Wundt establishing the first psychology laboratory. 3) Early schools of thought that influenced the development of psychology included structuralism, which analyzed the structure of the mind; functionalism, which examined how the mind functions; and gestalt psychology, which viewed perceptions as greater than their individual parts.

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Annabelle Buenaflor
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141 views2 pages

Week 2.1 Introduction To Psychology 1 Script

1) The document provides an introduction to the field of psychology, covering its definition, history, and early schools of thought. 2) Psychology is defined as the scientific study of human behavior and mental processes. Its roots can be traced back thousands of years to ancient beliefs, but it emerged as a formal science in the late 19th century with Wilhelm Wundt establishing the first psychology laboratory. 3) Early schools of thought that influenced the development of psychology included structuralism, which analyzed the structure of the mind; functionalism, which examined how the mind functions; and gestalt psychology, which viewed perceptions as greater than their individual parts.

Uploaded by

Annabelle Buenaflor
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Week 2.

1: Introduction to Psychology

Slides # Script
Good day everyone!. Our topic for this session will be all about the
Slide 1 Introduction to Psychology.

This includes the Nature and History of Psychology in which we will


specifically talk about the definition of terms and the roots of psychology.
 Nature and History of Psychology
Slide 2
Definition of Terms
Roots of Psychology
Slide 3 To start, in your own idea or understanding, what is psychology?
Psychology comes from the two Greek words Psyche which means the soul
and Logos which means the study. Psychology basically is defined as the
scientific study of human behavior and mental processes.
Human behavior could either be overt or covert behavior, it could be
Slide 4
conscious or unconscious, voluntary or involuntary, and may be rational or
irrational.
On the other hand, mental processes include our internal experiences such
as our sensations, dreams, thoughts, imaginations, perceptions, and
judgments.
Slide 5
Thus, psychology is the science that seeks to understand human behavior
and mental processes and how mental processes work and affect a certain
behavior.
We now look into the Roots of Psychology. Seven thousand years ago,
people assumed that psychological problems were caused by evil spirits.
They believed that people with psychological problems are being possessed
Slide 6
by evil spirits trapped in their body. To allow those spirits to escape from a
person’s body, ancient healers would chip a hole in a patient’s skull with
crude instruments. This procedure is called trephining .
According to Descartes, our brain is composed of nerves which are hollow
tubes where animal spirits conducted impulses in the same way that water
Slide 7 is transmitted through pipes. As these spirits enter into the nerves of the
brain, they then enter into the pores where these could have the power to
change the shape of the muscles and cause motion in all its parts.
On the other hand, in the 17th-century British philosopher John Locke
Slide 8 believed that children were born into the world with minds like “tabula
rasa” or “blank slates”. By this, their experiences will later on determine
what kind of adults they would become.
In contrast with the notion of Jhon Locke as our mid being a blank slate,
Plato assumed that character and intelligence are largely inherited and
Slide 9 that certain ideas are inborn. Thus, from the beginning, we already have
these inherited characteristics of the mind that we use as we dwell with
our different experiences.
Another famous philosopher in the name of Aristotle emphasizes the
relationship between the mind and the body in which for him, it makes no
sense to talk of a soul or mind without a body, for the essence of a person
Slide 10 is embedded and intertwined with their matter.

These ideas of the ancient people paved the way for the development and
further exploration of psychology.
Slide 11  However, the formal beginning of psychology as a scientific
discipline is generally considered to be in the late 19th century, in
Leipzig, Germany,
 When Wilhelm Wundt established the first experimental laboratory
devoted to psychological phenomena which aims to study the
building blocks of the mind.
 It focused on uncovering the fundamental mental components of
perception, consciousness, thinking, emotions, and other kinds of
mental states and activities.
Not long before, this new science of psychology became organized into
different branches, or schools of thought, each promoted by pioneering
Slide 12
thinkers. These early schools included structuralism and functionalism, and
gestalt psychology.
• Let us start with the Structuralism.
• This was the first school of Psychology founded by Edward B.
Titchener, an Englishman who studied under Wundt.
• Structuralism focused on breaking down mental processes to
understand the “structure” of the mind and tries to uncover the
Slide 13
fundamental mental components of consciousness, thinking, and
other kinds of mental states and activities.
• Introspection is the procedure used to study the structure of the
mind in which subjects are asked to describe in detail what they are
experiencing when they are exposed to a stimulus.
 Another school of thought was Functionalism which was formed as
a reaction to structuralism.
 This was heavily influenced by the work of William James, the first
American psychologist who set up the first psychology laboratory in
the United States (late 1870s)
 It studied how the complex mind processes evolve because of life
Slide 14
preserving functions and seeks to understand how sensations,
memories, and all other mental events that make up our ever-
flowing “stream of consciousness” help us adapt to our
environments
 Rather than focusing on the minds structure, functionalism
concentrated on what the mind does and how behavior functions
 The third school of thought is the Gestalt Psychology
 This was pioneered by a group German psychologist Hermann
Ebbinghaus and Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka , and Wolfgang
Kohler
Slide 15
 This school of thought emphasizes that “the whole is greater than
the sum of its parts” which means that our perception of things is
greater and more meaningful than the individual elements that
make up our perceptions.
These schools of thought, structuralism, functionalism, and gestalt
psychology, was sought to be of great significance in the future
development of psychology and paved the way for the development of
Slide 16
concepts and ideas which are deemed helpful in the advancement of
psychology and are widely used throughout generations until the present
times.
For questions and/or clarifications, you may ask your teachers or facilitators
Side 17
for further discussion during your asynchronous time schedule.

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